A Novel Use for Stone Genitals

On this day in 1900, Oscar Wilde died, in the Hotel d'Alscace in Paris, apparently from meningitis resulting from an ear infection (not, as was long assumed, syphilis). Illustrated above is his frankly bizarre and rather ugly tomb, designed by Jacob Epstein at Robbie Ross's request. That modernist angel originally had an impressive set of stone genitals (something of an Epstein trademark), but these proved irrestistible and were broken off and used as a paperweight by a succession of cemetery keepers, until they disappeared from view. In 2000 (according to Wikipedia) an 'intermedia artist' called Leon Johnson performed a ceremony, Re-Remembering Wilde, at the tomb, in the course of which a silver prosthesis was installed to replace the vandalised genitalia. What a charming thought - I'm sure Oscar would have been much amused.

A Mitcham Cabbage

This morning, as I walked through the park, cold rain was spattering down from a sodden sky. A cheerless prospect, from which even the usual standing army of crows (one of which I came across yesterday feasting with relish on a dead grey 'squirrel') had retired. I paused where the yew trees had formed a natural arch over the path, and became aware of a thin busy twittering sound all around me - a foraging party of tits, I guessed. But no - I soon realised that I was surrounded by goldcrests, some of them so low down in the branches that I could have reached out and touched them. These beady-eyed little birds - and they are truly tiny - seem to have little fear; perhaps being in company emboldens them. This party - there must have been a couple of dozen, probably more - was soon on its merry way (that chatty twittering sounds very much like a Synonym For Joy), but it had stayed long enough to lift my rainy heart. It had been, indeed, a gift from nowhere - a Mitcham Cabbage.

The Death of the Heart

Well, I have finished reading The Death of the Heart - about which I have so far only posted dietary notes. I must say that, though it has the ultimately elating quality of all really good art, it is a bleak and dejecting piece of work, beautifully but mercilessly wrought. (Synopsis: Orphaned 16-year-old Portia comes to stay with her half-brother Thomas and his wife Anna in their house overlooking Regent's Park. Neither of them wants her there. She falls in love with the philandering poseur Eddie, a 'friend' of Anna's, and all paths lead to betrayal, disenchantment and the 'death of the heart'.) Bowen writes in a rich, bold style, a dense and discriminating prose that sometimes ties itself in all but Jamesian knots - she is never an easy read, especially when she is exploring the nuances of the interior lives of her characters. But her bravura passages achieve quite extraordinary effects, especially when she is describing - rather, creating - her overwhelmingly present settings. No one is better on English weather - from the frozen Regent's Park with which the novel opens (Anna telling St Quentin about her discovery of Portia's diary) to the springtime and sea air (and, in a key passage, the brilliantly realised woodland) of the middle section of the novel, and on to the treacherous early summer back in London, the backdrop to Portia's final disenchantment. And no one is better on interiors - the elegantly oppressive house on Windsor Terrace, in winter and, in an especially vivid passage, after its great spring cleaning; the resounding, wind-defying seaside villa to which Portia is sent to get her out of the way; the self-consciously dismal room in which Eddie puts on his show of living; and, most heartbreakingly, the Karachi Hotel, temporary home of poor Major Brutt, the only other innocent who crosses Portia's path. Bowen is almost Dickensian in her dense, detailed evocation of the settings in which people live - and, as in Dickens, these interiors and exteriors provide far more than background - they are the structure of the novel, and, in sense, they are the people who inhabit them; indeed they often seem more real. The people with whom Portia is surrounded are not evil, not even bad as such (even Anna) - they have just got life wrong, and from sheer inertia are trapped unhappily where they are. Anna and Thomas plainly have an 'unhappy marriage', but they have glumly accommodated to it, to its silences and evasions, to the cold comfort of habit. They are the last people Portia should have had in her life, and she is the last person they should have had in theirs. The effect of her innocence on them - as a mirror which shows them their own corruption - and of their corruption on Portia's innocence, can only be catastrophic, and it can only be Portia who ultimately pays the price...
Final verdict? I'm glad I finally read what is clearly a masterpiece by a very remarkable writer. I should also say that, rather surprisingly, it develops into a real, riveting page turner - though, as the end approaches, one turns the pages with a degree of dread.

An Encounter

On the way to the station this morning (on foot of course), I passed a small round West Indian lady, who emitted a kind of yelp. I gave her a mildly inquiring look and she told me not to worry, she was just glad to be alive. She'd woken up this morning full of the joy of it, and, though she hadn't a bean in the bank and no idea what she was going to do with the day, she rejoiced in being up and about in God's world. I applauded her sentiments. She was especially bucked, she told me, laughing, because someone at Mitcham Junction had kindly given her two cabbages. She showed them to me - one large cabbage, one small - in a plastic bag. I congratulated her and shook her cordially by the hand. She went on her way rejoicing, and I strode off, warmed by the enounter, to catch my train. We all should rejoice, and often - why do we so seldom have the heart for it?

The Original of Jennings

There are diminishingly few reasons for reading newspapers, and I sometimes think that chief among them is the Telegraph obituaries page. There are more wonders here - deft character studies, outlines of quite extraordinary lives and careers, tragedies, comedies, tales of heroism, enterprise and folly - than in a library of novels, let alone newspapers. Here, too, is (one suspects) the chronicle of a vanishing England, and of vanishing human types... Yesterday yielded this richly comic gem, an account of a life well (if a little wildly) spent, which hardly needs further comment. Keep on scrolling down - it gets better and better.

Copenhagen

'Copenhagen, you're the end...'
In the small hours of this morning, a World Service report on the Copenhagen summit (of folly?) was heralded by the above snatch of a rather lovely early Scott Walker song. Smart work, I thought - it should be done more often. And thank heavens it wasn't Wonderful Wonderful Copenhagen... Many cities have an all too obvious signature tune for radio producers to wheel out - but this one was inspired. I now look forward to something happening in Andalucia - the old John Cale song is ready and waiting: Andalucia, When can I see ya? When it is snowing out again...
American towns and cities are especially well catered for in terms of signature music; over here our town names seem to lack the requisite glamour. 24 Hours From Peebles anyone? By the Time I Get to Cleethorpes? (Anyone know which old comedy show I nicked those from?)

Happy Birthday, Marilynne!

A reason to rejoice - it's Marilynne Robinson's birthday today. Furthermore she seems to be at the point where, relatively late in her career, the world is noticing her - especially since Home won the Orange Prize. Whether the world quite understands her is another matter... But for myself, I can only say that she's almost the only living writer who has changed the way I look at the world (and therefore changed the world I live in) and whose works seem to be deeply and entirely (though never solemnly) serious. I can only be grateful that such a writer is still at work - and, of course, wish her a happy birthday!